Wednesday, April 1, 2015

HO Status Report

I spent two weeks vacationing in Spain, and walked everywhere - up to 10 miles daily, over cobbled streets - and my hips held up just fine. But there is a lot of residual weakness all over the place.  At my 3-month visit to Dr. Santore he signed me up for physical therapy. More on that later.

I've skated twice, and it's the typical cautious return that happens every time I'm injured or cut upon. After dinking around a couple of times I decided to wait until everything is stronger. My PT, Ashley, worked with me after I sprained my ankle and already knows a lot about my body alignment issues.

I'm convinced that even during my PAO rehabs, I cheated on a lot of my exercises, and therefore everything that was weak then never got strong and I just learned how to compensate differently.  While this means the body is a wondrous machine, it really doesn't help me skate better.  This time I vow to do the exercises right, even if it means I can't walk the next day.

And that's about where I am -- in a lot of pain. I'm working the hip flexors, the glutes, the quads, the glutes, the hamstrings, the glutes, the adductors, the abductors, and of course, the glutes. Ashley showed me the CORRECT way to do clam shells which proves once and for all that I never did them right in the past.

GLUTES GLUTES GLUTES! It's all about the glutes.  I'm a skater, for Pete's sake, and I've never had strong butt muscles. So of course my body is all wonky and misaligned and crying out for help.

I guess at age 52 it's time to fix this once and for all.

3 comments:

Unknown said...

Terri, I am sitting here contracting my glutes even as I am reading your post. I think of PT now as a necessary penance for being allowed to skate. And like you, my goal is to skate pain-free; at some point there will be goals about skating beautifully, but right now I'd settle for anatomical peace. Here's hoping for a smooth recovery--things can only get better--Jo (of "joskates")

HipSk8 said...

Nice to hear from you Jo - I'll continue to read your blog as I'm only half finished, but we have similar "issues." It's good to know I'm not the only one who jumps clockwise and struggles with LFO edges. Even though I passed them long ago, it's now impossible for me to do the Quickstep Choctaw or the Argentine twizzle because anything with a LFO takeoff and the free leg in front is just not going to happen. We shall overcome!

Mary @ Fit and Fed said...

Isn't that frustrating? I too have been through a round of PT without actually doing the exercises right and ending the PT still with weak hip muscles. That was a couple of rounds of PT ago. And still working on my issues. But so much better than if we were not trying, right?